Month: June 2022

As per a report published in the science journal Nature on Wednesday, researchers said the results were convincing, but were surprised it took this long to establish the transmission.

The finding, published in the Emerging Infectious Diseases journal of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on June 6, came about by accident, said co-author Sarunyou Chusri, an infectious-disease researcher and physician at Prince of Songkla University in Hat Yai, southern Thailand. In August 2021, a father and son, who had tested positive for Covid-19, were transferred to an isolation ward at the university’s hospital. Their 10-year-old cat was also swabbed and tested positive. While being swabbed, the cat sneezed in the face of a veterinary surgeon, who was wearing a mask and gloves but no eye protection.

Three days later, the vet developed a fever, sniffles and a cough, and later tested positive for Covid, but none of her close contacts developed the disease, suggesting she had been infected by the cat.

Experimental studies have shown that infected cats don’t shed much virus, and shed for only a few days, says Leo Poon, a virologist at the University of Hong Kong, with Chusri saying people “should not abandon their cats, but take more care of them” in such cases.

The report released by the UN Office on Drug and Crime (UNODC) in Islamabad, however, said that despite these advantages, the Internet has so far not dramatically changed drug supply chains, and online platforms over all account for only a small portion of the global drug market.

Increased interconnectivity and the continuing evolution of online platforms has brought numerous advantages for both drug traffickers and people who use drugs.

The marketing and sale of controlled drugs and new psychoactive substance (NPS) on the Internet can take place at different levels: on the open Internet, also known as the “clear web”, often using encrypted communications tools; on social media applications; and on the “dark web”, which forms part of the deep web. People who use drugs shift between these platforms, reacting to perceived risks and difficulties in handling rapidly evolving technologies, report explains.

Meeting in Madrid, alliance leaders said Russia “is the most significant and direct threat to allies’ security and to peace and stability in the Euro-Atlantic area”.

This came as Nato welcomed Sweden and Finland as invitees to join the alliance and US President Joe Biden announced new deployments of US troops, ships and planes.

Biden boasted the US announcement was exactly what President Vladimir Putin “didn’t want” and Moscow, facing fierce resistance from Ukrainian forces equipped with Western arms, reacted with predictable fury.

Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov denounced the US military build-up, and warned Nato members that the shifting balance of power “would lead to compensatory measures on our part”.

“I think that those who propose such solutions are under the illusion that they will be able to intimidate Russia, somehow restrain it — they will not succeed,” he said.

Nato leaders have funnelled billions of dollars of arms to Ukraine and faced a renewed appeal from President Volodymyr Zelensky for more long-range artillery.

“Ukraine can count on us for as long as it takes,” Nato chief Jens Stoltenberg said, announcing a new Nato strategic overview that focuses on the Moscow threat.

“We cannot discount the possibility of an attack against allies’ sovereignty and territorial integrity,” the document, updated for the first time since 2010, said.

In a summit statement, they said: “Russia’s appalling cruelty has caused immense human suffering and massive displacements, disproportionately affecting women and children.” Zelensky had earlier addressed the Nato chiefs by videoconference, calling for stricter economic sanctions, but afterwards his foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba thanked Ukraine’s western friends.

“Today in Madrid, Nato proved it can take difficult but essential decisions. We welcome a clear-eyed stance on Russia, as well as the accession for Finland and Sweden,” he said.

“An equally strong and active position on Ukraine will help protect Euro-Atlantic security and stability.” While US and European chiefs expressed backing for Ukraine in Madrid, Indonesian President Joko Widodo became the first Asian leader to visit Kyiv since the war began.

Zelensky said he had accepted an invitation to attend the upcoming G20 summit in Bali, depending “on the security situation in the country and on the composition of the summit’s participants”. It is not clear whether Putin will also be on the guest list in November, with some capitals pushing for his exclusion.

As Western leaders met in Madrid, in Ukraine officials complained that Russian missiles had hit civilian housing and businesses in and around the cities of Dnipro, Mykolaiv and Kharkiv, leaving at least seven dead and 14 wounded.

In Kremenchuk, the town where a Russian missile on Monday destroyed a shopping centre and — according to local officials — killed at least 18 civilians, clearing operations continued.

A giant crane was working near the site of the impact and in the rubble-strewn parking area shopping trolleys piled with clothes and household goods lay abandoned.

The indirect negotiations in Qatar are an attempt to reboot long-running European Union-mediated talks on a return to the 2015 nuclear agreement between Tehran and world powers.

Iran’s chief negotiator Ali Bagheri is set to meet the talks’ coordinator, EU deputy secretary-general Enrique Mora, on the evening of day two in Qatar.

“The two-day talks are not over yet and this evening another meeting will be held between” Bagheri and Mora, Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Nasser Kanani said in Tehran.

“The talks in Doha, which are taking place in a professional and serious atmosphere, were scheduled for two days from the beginning,” Kanani said.

No time-limit had previously been announced on the talks, which are taking place in a Doha hotel with a US delegation headed by special envoy Robert Malley.

An EU source said that the discussions, which come two weeks before US President Joe Biden makes his first official visit to the region, were supposed to last several days. The parties have “exchanged views and proposals on the remaining issues”, Kanani said.

The US State Department meanwhile said that the indirect consultations were ongoing in Doha, but said it had nothing immediately to say about the talks.

A State Department spokesperson said the US was prepared to return to the deal, but reiterated calls for Tehran “to drop their additional demands that go beyond” the scope of the pact.

Differences between Tehran and Washington have notably included Iran’s demand that its Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps be removed from a US terror list.

‘Trump method’

The arch-rivals are meeting indirectly — passing messages from different areas of the same hotel — to try to break an impasse in attempts to restart the 2015 agreement.

The deal, which lifted sanctions in return for Iran curbing its nuclear programme, was abandoned unilaterally by former US president Donald Trump in 2018. The international talks on reviving the deal had been taking place since April 2021 in Vienna, before the process stalled last March.

Iranian officials earlier said they were hoping for progress in Qatar — but warned the Americans to abandon the “Trump method” of negotiating.

“We hope that, God willing, we can reach a positive and acceptable agreement if the United States abandons the Trump method,” Iranian government spokesman Ali Bahadori-Jahromi said.

He described the “Trump method” as “non-compliance with international law and past agreements and disregard for the legal rights of the Iranian people”.

Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian also said Iran was open to a deal in Doha, but that it wouldn’t cross its “red lines”.

“We are serious” in our desire to finalise an agreement, he said, stressing that his country would not retreat from the “red lines” it has drawn.

“If the American side has serious intentions and is realistic, an agreement is available at this stage and in this round of negotiations,” he said, quoted by IRNA state news agency.

IRNA has previously described the “red lines” as lifting all sanctions as related to the nuclear agreement, creating a mechanism to verify they have been lifted, and making sure the US does not withdraw from the deal.

The deal has been hanging by a thread since 2018, when Trump unilaterally withdrew and began reimposing harsh economic sanctions on America’s arch-enemy.

Soaring oil prices and the lack of spare capacity make this an opportunity for Tehran to push for the lifting of sanctions on Iranian crude, said Alex Vatanka, director of the Iran programme at the Washington-based Middle East Institute think tank.

Talking to reporters aboard Air Force One, Mr Sullivan also indicated that US President Joe Biden and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi may also hold direct talks on this issue.

“We have begun talks with India about how a price cap would work and what the implications would be,” he said. “And then, if necessary, it can be elevated” to the leadership level, he added.

The US media reported this week that India’s crude oil imports from Russia have jumped 50 times since Feb 24, when Moscow invaded Ukraine.

Indian refineries bought about 25 million barrels of Russian oil in May – pushing the imports from Russia to 10 per cent of the total sea-bound imports from 0.2 per cent in 2021 and early 2022.

In April, President Joe Biden told Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi it was not in India’s interest to increase its imports of energy from Russia. In Washington, the White House issued a statement saying that Mr Sullivan spoke by phone with his Indian counterpart Ajit Doval on Monday. “Mr Sullivan reaffirmed President Biden’s commitment to a strong and enduring US-India strategic partnership based on our shared commitment to democracy,” the White House said.

“They discussed the importance of continuing close cooperation in the Indo-Pacific region, promoting regional security, and renewing efforts to collaborate on global challenges, including Covid-19 and climate change,” the statement added, without mentioning the oil consultations.

But during a press gaggle aboard the US presidential plane on the way to Madrid, Spain, a reporter asked if the oil issue was also discussed during the G-7 meeting in Schloss Elmau on Monday, he said ministers of the G-7 nations have now been tasked with by their leaders to work on the specifics of how a price cap would actually work.

“One aspect of that, of course, is intensive engagement with key consuming countries. India is one of those countries. That engagement has begun,” he added. “We have begun talks with India about how a price cap would work and what the implications of it would be.”

Asked if President Biden spoke with Prime Minister Modi about this issue specifically, Mr Sullivan said: “The President did not speak with Prime Minister Modi about this yesterday, but at senior levels of the US government, we had communications with the Indians yesterday.”

Indicating that President Biden and Mr Modi may discuss the issue soon, he said: “Before it goes to leader-to-leader level, we need to work through the details with their team at basically the Cabinet level, which is where it is right now.”

“He assured to play his role for further improvement in diplomatic cooperation with Pakistan at all levels,” the ISPR said after Mr Yang met Gen Bajwa at the General Headquarters.

Mr Yang, who is considered a personal representative of President Xi Jinping because of his position in Chinese hierarchy, is leading a high-level delegation comprising vice ministers for foreign affairs and commerce, vice chairman of China International Development Cooperation Agency (CIDCA), and deputy secretary general of the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) on the visit that is taking place at a crucial juncture in bilateral ties.

It was probably in this context that Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif sent his special assistant and point man on foreign policy Tariq Fatemi to receive him at the airport.

Yang holds talks with Bilawal, army chief

While emphasising the significance of his trip, China experts say Mr Yang is ranked even higher than Foreign Minister Wang Yi. He has in the past represented China in National Security Advisers’ talks with the United States. Therefore, it is said that whatever demands and concerns he conveys and any commitments that he makes during his meetings here will be seen as coming directly from President Xi.

The bilateral relationship currently appears under deep stress because of growing terrorist attacks on Chinese citizens. Beijing is particularly concerned about the lack of progress in the prosecution of the April 26 attack in which three Chinese language teachers were killed in Karachi. It is said that neither the mastermind nor other major actors involved in the attack have been apprehended.

The Chinese had demanded permission for deployment of private Chinese security guards for the protection of Chinese personnel and installations. Though Pakistani authorities did not allow that, the issue remains very much on the table.

The Chinese, moreover, are pushing for Majeed Brigade, the banned Balochistan Liberation Army’s Fidayeen (suicide) unit, to be listed on the UNSC 1267 Terror Sanctions list. The group has been behind most of the attacks on Chinese.

Gen Bajwa, during his visit to China earlier this month, sought to assuage the Chinese concerns by reiterating the army’s commitment to ensuring ‘foolproof security’. His effort helped in showing Pakistani top brass’ seriousness on CPEC security, but Chinese are waiting for words to be matched by deeds.

The ISPR, in its statement on Bajwa-Yang meeting, however, suggested that the Chinese side was satisfied with the renewed commitments. “The visiting dignitary thanked COAS for special measures taken for provision of safe and secure environment for Chinese personnel employed on various projects in Pakistan,” it said.

Secondly, Beijing is upset over the issue of more than Rs300 billion receivables of the Chinese companies operating in Pakistan.

Mr Yang also met Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari.

“The two sides discussed entire spectrum of bilateral relations and exchanged views on regional and global issues of mutual interest,” the FO said in a statement.

During the visit, Mr Yang will also call on Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif.